


The Inobservance of the delay in the Art of affections

by Asia191



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Aged-Up Character(s), Appointment, Art, Daichi a real worker, Established Relationship, Fluff, Le Corbusier, M/M, Memories, Museum of Western Art, Museums, Post-Impressionist, Sawamura Daichi in Love, Sugawara kindergarden teacher, Tokyo (City), Vincent Van Gogh - Freeform, a lot of fluff, kiss
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-17
Updated: 2017-03-17
Packaged: 2018-10-06 09:45:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,272
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10331858
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Asia191/pseuds/Asia191
Summary: “Yellow, for example, was found to be an expression of absolute passion: vibrant, free, intense in its tone and dangerously totalitarian, ready to swallow all the colors framing the reality until it was possible to see nothing but it filtered through his lens. An addictive shade, just like the undiluted absinthe the fragile and progressive artist used to ingest during his phase of estrangement from the world.A shade that, in many ways, reminded Daichi of the same Koushi, that amazingly human lens through whom the world looked different, so moved and so alive, so much brilliant to consume even the night.”





	

**Author's Note:**

> Hello and first of all: thank you for opening this fanfiction! ♡ This is the first time I write a DaiSuga so I’m a little overwhelmed by the nervousness, ah ah! Anyway! I imagined them in their thirties (some years before actually), so they’re older than the original ones, I hope you’ll appreciate it even them even if not in their canonical age! Let me know what do you think, if you want! ♡

_L_ _ateness_ has never been a peculiar trait of Daichi.  
Indeed, Daichi _himself_ has – generally – never been used to be surrounded by pathological latecomers, seeing that habit more as a lack of respect towards others, rather than a real block these people have towards watches and alarm clocks of any type. They tried to make him change his mind about it over and over again, and Koushi himself laughed multiple times at his instinctive distrusting that kind of person, not even sparing amusing jokes while busy to pass him the spoon and leave him a gentle kiss on the head – hazelnut colored locks covering it.

But not even these last attempts have never served much, and eventually the snowy-haired boy had to agree to be unable to find an excuse valid for the irremovable older one, not in front of what he really sees as an insurmountable flaw.

Daichi, instead, has always preferred people who arrive _on time_. He never asked for someone to come early, it has to be said, neither for appointments scheduled with exaggerated anticipation, nor even he has been the kind of person who deposits who knows what abundant deposit a year before a possible vacation.

It could therefore be said, more generally, that he has never been an _excesses_ _lover_ _,_ and that _time_ seems to be just one of many examples people could do to let everyone notice his preference towards the "right balance", as he would call it.

Not too late, not too early.  
Not too sweet, not too bitter.  
Not too packed, not too infrequent.

Only the extreme guarantee born of the tranquility of the _right_.

Sure, he’s never been so hard to preclude a relationship born and grown in the past years at school because of those five or ten minutes too many, also because if it were so he probably would have already stopped showing up to the meetings with Asahi – always, and he would like to stress the _always_ , in advance of an interval that goes from fifteen minutes to twenty minutes abundant – or with Nishinoya – on the contrary, always late of _at least_ fifteen full minutes.

Yet, it must be said that even the friendship that bonds him to the people closest to him has never been enough to make him get easily over the tribulations of the expectations that sometimes some people selfishly oblige others to live. So important for him that more than once he has found himself, serious look and grave voice, repeating to the two men – just like a father who scolds his sons because of a prank – the importance of education in avoiding someone could live a life of solitude and quiet expectations waiting for them: even more if that person – in all probability – had chosen a appointment with you in front of an other one.

 

The delay is not a peculiar feature of Daichi even when he raises the vacant and tired look from the pile of cards and business documents, his eyelids heavy from exhaustion and the tendon of his right hand pulling imperceptibly the inside of the wrist, quarreling with the fifth finger in an attempt to keep it anchored to that writing bending.

The needles of wall-clock seem to emulate his state of mental exhaustion, moving slowly and gently on the white table surrounded by roman signs that distinguish the succession of hours. Daichi lowers his gaze again on the dark ink that stains the rough papers placed on the bench, and while waiting to receive the latest information from his colleague – probably still in the photocopy shop – he corrects something with the pencil, lead heavy on those few documents about the Annual Report of the ended year.

He sighs sadly when the graphite decides to oppose to the physical fatigue the young man is forcing it from hours, breaking itself in the middle of the tracking and probably trying in this way to win his little revolution, begun since the Company’s supervisor came – hours ago – at their office, informing him of the inconsistency of some results published in the last documentation and asking him to make a quick review of the same ones.

Daichi lays the pencil, now unusable, on the side of the binders stacked on the desk border and lowers his eyelids, bringing the thumb and index finger at the inner end of the eyebrows arch and lowering his head just down, laying his right hand elbow on the dark lacquered walnut wood.

The migraine developed almost one hour before weighs his temples down, and for few seconds the pressure of the fingertips seems to have no effect, the tension on the front part of the forehead that gives the guy the uncomfortable feeling of having an iron rod pushing hard against the warm skin.

He remains in that position for a few moments, silent and slightly curved on himself, and it is in that very first moment of absolute stillness that he senses a vibration located at the side of the desk, partially choked by piles of paper that seem to hide the source from him and to remind him at the same time the incredible amount of work he has been subject to until a few seconds before.

His left hand moves enfeebled towards those papers and economy books, until his fingers work out to capture with some difficulty the small rectangular object imprisoned below, pulling it out of the rigid cellulose that kept him hidden and showing the screen just in time to see the two green and red discs of the call disappearing from the screen.

He does not think he knows how his cellphone got under there, sincerely speaking, but at the exact time he unlocks the screen his irises are exaggerated by a subtle shade of confusion while he instinctively wonders, as he was engulfed in without hesitation by the huge amount of numbers fell from the documents, if something happened in the meantime outside, something of which he does not know anything yet and that could be linked to the end of the world of the beginning of the WWIII, for example.

In the background of the initial page of his phone, in fact, stands out a small square with rounded corners, and inside it at least two calls and four messages from the same consignee make their appearance, static after the last received call message not accepted by the guy.  
  
✉ Koushi S;

" I’ve just got out from kindergarten, you'd never imagine who Hitomi said he would like to be as adult, ha ha! Maybe we'll talk about it this afternoon, have a great day at work! "

24:34 - 12/22/2016

✉ Koushi S;

" I was thinking to arrive a few minutes before to buy tickets, what do you think? So maybe you don’t have to rush in the office; I’ll say it, your boss does not seem to be a nice person to ask permissions. (I always get them!) "

15:03 - 12/22/2016

✉ Koushi S;

" I'm coming now, ten minutes and I should be at the Museum. See you there "  
  
6:40 - 12/22/2016

✉ Koushi S;

" You missed a call from me at 17:09 22 Dec. This is a free Call Alert from O2. "

17:11 - 12/22/2016  
  
All of a sudden something relighted in Daichi, and in an instant he is standing, cellphone in hand and eyes nervous and into a frenzied feeling of discomfort. The lower arrow of the wall-clock of the study has just passed five, while the longer one strikes near it, alighting secure a few centimeters from the other one and marking a time the young man struggles hard to believe.

Because all of a sudden it's all _much too clear:_ his cellphone left on the desk in the first place. In a mixture of worry and discomfort he bitterly understands he was so focused his last hours in correcting those documents the supervisor has placed under his care he has totally forget about the appointment he had with the other one, and the dark thick eyebrows wrinkle expressing his concern while the long and well-defined fingers go to press quickly on the mobile screen, instantly tapping the photo of Sugawara’s face before picking up the phone to his ear.

«... Daichi?»

Daichi’s heart skips a beat hearing the voice clearly worried and agitated of Sugawara filling the silence left by the outgoing call, and before he can really avoid it he imagines him there, in front of the place of their appointment, tickets bent in the coat and looking worried while watching faces of strangers passing on the sidewalk, trying to recognize his one among many.

«Koushi? Oh God forgive me, the supervisor stopped me at work and– For how long have you been there? I'm coming, you just have to leave me the time to write a note to my colleague, okay?»

«... Ok, but Daichi–»

«I can not understand how it happened, really. You know I do not like delays, but there was this problem in the office and I had to take care of it, at least for this part. I am the only one that also makes accounting and–!»

«Daichi, it’s not a problem–»

«Seriously Koushi, forgive me. We had to meet at five, and instead I’m still here–»

«Daichi, don’t worry: I have nothing to do today. It doesn’t change anything if I wait for you a little more. As long as I know you’re going to come, I'm not moving from here.»  
  
Despite the shame that is gripping him right now, a shy hint of a smile appears on Sawamura’s lips hearing his partner’s words, and while he feels his heart pumping on his sternum he writes quickly with a gel pen – found on his colleague’s desk – a list of things to follow to end the practices partially checked by him in the last five hours.

He moves exactly towards the entrance of the office, quickly taking the coat from the hanger and rolling the warm scarf softly crinkled around the neck, pressing the elevator call button with his free hand and then changing ear, the right arm getting up from folded and enabling him to check his horrible lateness.

«I’m coming soon, okay?»

«I know. I’m waiting for you.»

«Okay, I love you.»

He can hear the other one breathing on the phone a slight laugh, and lips part more imagining his partner at that moment, his eyes closed, his straight and french nose slightly curled and the hand which is not holding the phone closed in a fist, to cover his smile while raising his large scarf he gave him two Christmas ago.

«I love you too, now hurry up.»

«It’s a promise.»  
  
And with that he ends the call, bringing the phone back to the pocket and getting fast on the elevator arrived in the meantime. He leaves the building briskly, looking left and right in the last attempt to meet his colleague, but he eventually gives up, arriving at the crossing and going through the direction of the Jouban underground stop.

The journey is not too long, but to Daichi it genuinely seems to last an eternity; it's already a quarter to six when he comes out from Ueno station after all, and their appointment had to start at least forty minutes before.

He fixes the buttons of the double breasted coat for what could be the hundredth time, and after passing the annual transportation card he moves quickly toward the traffic light, smiling at an elderly lady waiting to see the green light appearing and eventually crossing with her the street in a sorely needed slowness, shopping bags in hand while listening to her talking about her life and her children now adults: he smiles politely, and she fits with some hesitancy her arm under his, him helping her to cross the street while she declares in the meantime and in a sweet and shaky voice how she has been blessed to have met a young man so respectable and so polite. Daichi accompanies her for a little longer, shaking his head when the woman puts the gaunt hand on the purse asking him if she owes something to her knight, and at the unexpected title the right hand of the guy goes to massage with a pinch of awe the base of his neck, smiling shyly while refusing the money one last time and wishing her a good day.

The gaze falls back on the clock he wears on the wrist then, and seeing that it is barely ten minutes at six he takes again the cellphone, opening it and sending a message to his partner to warn him about being near to the Museum of Western Art.

He holds his mobile phone in hand for another couple of minutes, checking it from time to time as he moves in large strides down the main streets of Uenokoen, surpassing traffic lights and intersections, parking lots and small supermarkets, until he sees the large building of the characteristic spiral structure in the distance, developed through cubic modules that Daichi has repeatedly seen increasing depending on the number of works of art on display throughout the seasons.

He still remembers when he studied for the first time the construction of that building in high school, and especially remembers the researches done with Sugawara about Le Corbusier and his perennial pursuit of innovation and originality, thinking about how strange is, in its way, returning in that place where it all started. It’s all there: the researches he and the younger one have spent much time and energy to do, the days passed outside the structure and the hours that led them, almost thirteen years ago, to be more near to each others, just those few centimeters more than usual that were just enough to ensure the vital breath of one entered forever in the life of the other.

For Sawamura it all began there, in front of Van Gogh's Sunflowers painting, during a trip that Sugawara had asked to do by taking advantage of that research both of them had to do for technical education, carried by an enthusiasm to which Daichi had not really been able to say no, especially after coming to know the absolute passion of his friend for that artist and the trend in general.

Sawamura, putting it frankly, had never been a great flatterer of post-impressionism; he preferred Classicism, Greek art, the mimic and unchanging ideal of beauty expressed by order, harmony and balance of the transposition of what is true to the eyes. But when he saw the other one's face and his hope enlightening his big brown eyes he was simply unable to say _no:_ he found himself going to that exhibit driven more by affection - which he was learning to recognize as an emotion split from the one felt for his other friends - that a real interest towards that art, looking in view while the white-haired boy approached to the first, second, third artwork, ecstatic expression and lips parted in surprise in front of the waves of color, density, spirals and hatches.

Daichi had patiently listened to his teenager friend explaining, showing, describing those reactions Van Gogh had inspired in him and in Daichi by that effort on his colors, yellow and blue, orange and green, colors that became the language of his experience and his adherence to physical stimuli in its environment, reflection of his inner feelings and well defined scale of emotions.

Yellow, for example, was found to be an expression of absolute passion: vibrant, free, intense in its tone and dangerously totalitarian, ready to swallow all the colors framing the reality until it was possible to see nothing but it filtered through his lens. An addictive shade, just like the undiluted absinthe the fragile and progressive artist used to ingest during his phase of estrangement from the world.

A shade that, in many ways, reminded Daichi of the same Koushi, that amazingly human lens through whom the world looked different, so moved and so alive, so much brilliant to consume even the night and, after the development of their relationship, so bright to make the same dark unable to come down, to bring its blue and its purple on that bed where the young and amateur artist – who was Daichi – loved every night that beloved blaze of yellow which was able to dominate his paintings.

The thirty year old man looks around, stepping aside not to block the stream of people that is moving towards the entrance of the building or away to take the metro, and eyelids wear thin while trying to focus as many faces as possible, looking for one in particular: small, tight jaw, his white hair like milk, eyes of a light cherry wood and a small beauty mark on the right side.

He _sense_ _s_ him, rather than seeing him, only after a few minutes and too many glances at the phone, remained unnaturally quiet since getting on the metro almost twenty minutes ago, and apologizes with a couple of pedestrians while unwittingly bumping into some of them, drunk from the urgency climbed quickly all together to get to his partner, to see him, to feel him next to him now that he knows he’s so close and yet so incomprehensibly far away.

 

One, two, three rows of people; a family, a group of teenagers, a trip of seniors from some countries outside Tokyo; Daichi surpasses them all, and only when he’s just few meters away he can finally see a little more of that head and of those hair with silver reflections.

Yet, as he is still approaching the other one, he can not help but notice the other one being a bit lower than usual, the fold the coat on the back that makes himself slightly more arched down, legs slightly bent and something, or someone, or better yet _more little someone_ _s_ with their arms all stretched out holding the jacket, fabric squeezed between tight fists wrapped in their fleece gloves to have Sugawara as close as possible.

«Koushi ...?»

He would like to look more confident as he pronounces the name of his partner, but honestly - and besides his effort – he can not avoid his warm brown eyes to slip with traces of honest confusion to those children aged between four and seven years, not knowing exactly how to categorize that situation in which that morning, lost in his thoughts about that day planned for so long – and before ending up in that maelstrom of data and annual tranches – he would have never thought he would have stumbled in, honestly speaking.

The older one waits until Sugawara’s honeyed eyes raises from those little talkative, ears covered by those sugar-like hair and recalled by that uncertain but warm tone, and the back straightens barely enough as to let him look at his partner without having to excessively stress the neck, as to coerce any of those three small figures to loosen their grip on his long cream-colored coat.

«Ah, Daichi! You arrived sooner than I thought!»

Just the time to recognize him and two small dimples pinch involuntarily Sugawara’s cheeks while his lips part in a warm and friendly smile, and seeing him Daichi can not help but instinctively smile back, driven by a love that smells of home and safe, bed sheets and silences.

«I don’t think so, I told you I would have come as soon as I can, remember?»

Sugawara drafts a slight laugh, and Daichi slightly shakes his head, smile still open cutting partially those cheeks of an olive skin tone.

«I didn’t mean to be so late, I’m sorry. I also tried to text you, but I think you haven’t seen the message.»

«Really, you texted me?! Maybe I missed it?»

The guy puts his hand into his coat pocket, and not without some difficulty due to the rather uncomfortable position he stubbornly keeps holding he finally pulls out a small light blue cellphone, pressing a button to illuminate the screen.  
  
«Ah–»  
  
At this point, it is quite probably it has arrived.  
  
«I'm sorry Daichi, I didn’t hear it– You, kids? Did you hear it?»

And while asking his question he return looking at the young kids in front of him, reserving to each of them his smile. The older of the three, a girl, smiles happily, shaking the little oval face and showing a beautiful balcony instead of his milk teeth as her hand goes to loosen the grip on Sugawara’s jacket, carrying her arms at the sides of her bust and doing a shrug in denial.

Daichi sees in the meantime the second child, a girl younger than the first one, inflating her soft cheeks and frowning as a small mumbling saucepan, probably incredibly in disagree with the idea of the phone ringing in general. The last child, however, seems like he’s simply watching him: hidden behind Sugawara’s leg, tiny little hands tightening slightly the fabric of his pants and slender shoulders serving as a shelter to the rounded head and those rosy cheeks. He almost looks like he’s studying him, deciding at that moment whether or not to trust him, if he wants to tell him some kind of important secret or to keep it to himself.

Even Sugawara seems to notice it, and after lowering his chin he looks at him, following his eyes until returning from Daichi to the little boy, saying simply:

«... And you, Neji? Do you want to say something to Mr. Sawamura?»

That little head, at those words, seems to withdraw even more to the reassuring folds of Koushi’s jacket, and thin eyebrows wrinkle a little more, the lower lip that gain a little bit of the upper one space, putting forward and giving to that round little face an expression of pure childish indecision.

«...»  
  
Daichi smiles, warm eyes trying to instill a little confidence in that little boy all wrapped behind the slender legs of his companion, but he doesn’t bend down to avoid infusing too much fear in the smaller one, albeit in his mind continues to swirl lazily the idea something is just off and that he really shouldn’t get used to the idea of Koushi with three kids following overnight.

«... Daichi–»

The little boy pronounces that name almost with fear, voice vibrant and insecure while his little head sinks more between slender shoulders, plunging it into the little jacket decorated by spaceships and stars painted on the waterproof fabric.

«Yes?»

He spurs him to continue, lowering a little his legs in order to give the baby the opportunity to be heard without having to raise his voice too much.

«... Are you my dad?»

... Well then. As Daichi had not exactly a clear idea of what to expect from this little human being, it must be said that question is not exactly one of those he would have expected to receive. The smile remains fixed on his face, frozen on his dark and taut lips, and eyelids close and reopen quickly a few times, trying to dampen the irises still fixed on the younger one.

«… Your–?»

He hears someone clearing his throat and coughing nervously a small puff of breath, and his eyes just slips further up towards Sugawara, who is looking tense for a few moments before starting with short restless movements to touch his scarf. He smiles tensely, while the left hand goes to rest in an attempt of reassurance on the little baby's head, ruffling those dark and curly locks and bowing a bit more to bring his face closer to the baby.

«Neji, why you– ? Oh, wait, maybe Daichi– I mean, mr. Sawamura. reminds you of your dad?»

He tries to articulate, voice just a shade higher than usual and slightly hesitant. The smaller one shakes his head, squeezing more his tiny little fists on the fabric of Koushi’s clothing, moving closer to him and almost coming to embrace his leg around the soft dark trousers cotton.

«... Daichi is my dad.»

«Do you mean ... Are you sure is _him_ _?_ »

«Yes, mom always says that.»

The little boy nods shyly, and in an instant a cold silence descends on both the adults. The older one can see the other one's face turning away from the baby and lingering his chestnut irises on the older one, and Daichi’s eyes move to meet his partner’s ones, in all honesty more driven by an instinctive duress than by a conscious choice. Yet a first look is enough, and the older one feels the blood freezing in the arteries, the surprised and slightly confused expression he reserved for the little boy that finds in the other's a tactless dive towards pure panic.  
  
«… Oh, really?»  
  
The smile that Sugawara gives to Sawamura can not be called _cold_ , but that's because Daichi is quite sure the arctic temperature necessary to define something as cold is too high compared to the one felt at that moment.

No, the absolute zero Koushi’s eyes reach is simply indefinable, and perhaps is even more alarming if Daichi tries to look at the trace of absolute relax on the lack of any expressive wrinkle on his partner’s face, an incredible nonexistence of spontaneity that comes well with the predominant presence of an intimidation he saw more that once in his mate’s eyes, though every time he hopes it’ll be the last.

It always surprises him how his beloved one manages to be the sweetest and at the same time the most unsettling guy he has ever met in his life.

«Ha ha, come on, don’t look at me like that. I swear I don’t know what–»

«He talks about the fact you're his dad, Daichi. Do I have to congratulate you?»

«... Koushi, really. I don’t really know what he's talking about–»

«Ah, excuse me for being late! Queue was longer than expected at the ticket office!»

When the voice of a woman enters Daichi’s acoustic area the guy almost doesn’t mind it, taken as he is from that moment of absolute panic he’s living towards all that absurd situation. Seeing those children materializing next to Koushi has already been something he would have never expected to see that day, and that in itself would have been _enough_ to give that evening an unexpected twist. But now one of these children says he’s his own flesh and blood, and compared to this even the fact Koushi has inexplicably become these three children’ guardian lost a little of consistency in his pyramid of _unexpected things of the day_.

«… Mom!»

The older of the three children says, and after she has pronounced that word all of them turn to her right side, suddenly incredibly disinterested in him even if he’s still bent towards them. After a second of hesitation even Daichi turns, perhaps to get away from Sugawara’s gaze, perhaps to see the possible mother of his children, or perhaps simply to try to understand whether it is possible he suffers from some type of identity disorder and he’s unaware of a part of his life, including the relationship with a married woman.

The person who appears in front of him is a woman of about thirty-five years old, tall, long and dark hair and warm dark brown eyes. He recognizes in her features those of the older girl, in her eyes the same as the smaller one, and at some point it becomes clear enough that all three small babies are related to each other and to her, certainly more than they are with himself at least.

Something is in any case quite unlikely to be possible, he needs to remember to himself.

  
«Did you behave well, kids? Thank you again for the help sir–»

«Mum, mum!»

«Not now sweetheart, mum has to say something important to this young man. As I was saying, I would never have known how to stand in line with them if you had not offered to help me, let me–»

«But mom, there's daddy!»

Daichi realizes that, in that entire situation, he’s almost reassured by the fact that now there are three adults in silence, rather than just him and Koushi. One thing is if those who remain in silence in front of this sentence are Sugawara and him, an other one if it’s the mother of the one who claims to be his son.  
  
«... Honey, you know. Dad is in Heaven, he can not be here–»

He hears her softly answering him after a few seconds, smiling tenderly to her son and crouching next to him to gently caress the dark little head, watching the boy shaking his head and breaking away from Koushi to indicate him with conviction.

«No! It's dad, that man told it! It’s true, is it true that you said so, sir?»

And Daichi sees it, sees the difficulty of Koushi while he lowers along with the child's mother, completely different compared to the one he was a couple of minutes before with him; he smiles too, taking that little hand in his, tapered and snowy fingers that slip to take the baby’s soft and little ones between his own, eyes still staring at the boy.

«Neji, is it because he’s called Daichi? Your dad’s name was Daichi?»

The mother looks up towards Sugawara and then towards him, and Daichi can clearly see in the look of the woman the silent and composed surprise both understanding the reason for this moment of confusion, both realizing that this young man, at least five years younger than her and probably so different from her missing husband, has the same name of her beloved one.

The young boy nods, going imperceptibly closer to his mother but still looking at Koushi, the little face a bit moody and defensive, and Koushi smiles slightly, barely bending his head to the side and letting the bright strands of his fringe to slip sideways, showing his beauty mark next to his eye, before that involuntarily hidden due to a previous gust of wind.

«But Neji- Daichi is not your dad. I'm sure your dad was special to you and your sisters. He was special for your mom, also- But this Daichi, instead–»

He looks up, smiling when he sees Sawamura among the little girls, hands resting on their small shoulders to keep them protected from the crowd while the other two adults are sitting by the youngest child sides.

«He's special to me. He’s _my_ Daichi.»

...

... And Daichi knows it: he knows their relationship has always been like that.

There have never been big words, no important announcement or “old school” scenes that some, perhaps many, would like to live in the first person in their lives. Theirs was a relationship that has evolved over time, steadily, driven by an everyday life and a love that has never had peaks, but only light curves in constant climb, a soft confidence that has led them to share a future they didn’t know they had.

Daichi knows it, and he would not change any of that.

Not a comma, not a date. He would not change the moment he realized he was in love with Koushi, the moment his hand discovered to be fearful and hopeful of touching the partner’s one, the first time his big arms embraced him with that awareness of wishing he was going to be by his side forever while the other one, young and fresh like spring after winter, slightly raised his face, unfolding his rosy lips into a smile and bending his arm up to touch his hot cheek with emotion through the soft and delicate fingertip.

He wouldn’t change the first time he told him what he felt for him, coming back from gym, the sun red like autumn leaves and the sky purple as September grapes, as he wouldn’t change Koushi’s confused look, the raise of those white eyelids, and then the spreading emotion, the _hope_ and the excited and unexpected response.

He would not change their first kiss, he would not change the first attempts, the embarrassment, the unfinished _things_. He would not change their initial researches on the Internet, the laughters and the complicity of their first times; he would not change even the first visit to the pharmacy, happened at closing time to get those things they had read were necessary but that had not the courage to ask to the pharmacist, waiting instead for the structure to close to take them from the machine out there, while looking down with money in their pockets and banknotes between trembling hands.

He would not change any of those moments, those of happiness, those of sadness. He would not change anything, not the evenings spent to smile, not the ones spent crying. He wouldn’t even change the moment when he asked to Koushi to forgive him, to forget, to move forward together.

He would not change anything because that would mean change, in some way, even Koushi.

And if there's one thing Daichi knows is that he would never change Koushi for anything in the world.

Sugawara smiles, and Sawamura knows he saw in his eyes all of this, all these sentences and those certainties condensed into a look that Koushi is not afraid to give to the other one, a breath of love and involvement Daichi has been breathing for years and he’s never tired to receive.

The younger one stares at him for another few moments, before lowering his eyes and lay them back again on the little boy, still there, insecure and a bit confused.

«Do you understand it? Your dad looks at you from up there, he loves you all and he’s only yours.»

The small boy seems to think it over, then nods weakly, lengthening short arms towards the mother's neck and sinking his head in the warm corner near that woman's shoulder. Daichi sees her smiling, as she pulls up the little boy and stands up, thanking Sugawara and Sawamura for their patience and making a sign to the two little girls still beside him, mimicking a slight bow toward the two men and asking her children to say goodbye, before turning to the entrance of the exhibition.

Daichi watches them leaving, and for a moment that mother figure with those children reminds him of his own mother, when he was still young and accompanied her to the supermarket with his younger brothers to help with the shopping bags. A strong, independent woman, away from her husband often due to his business, incredibly attentive and so in love with her family as much as with her job.

But he didn’t have time to close himself on that memory he feels the light footsteps of Koushi indulging his movement, and little time passes before he feels the right sleeve of the coat the other one is wearing gently scratching the left sleeve of his own, his breath gliding in the direction of the family just left.

«... A dad, hmm?»

And Daichi can not help but smile, lowering his eyelids and puffing inside the hot raw fabric scarf.

«I'm too young for these things, don’t you think?»

«A few years ago, maybe.»

And this time Daichi just can’t avoid a laugh, both because – knowing Koushi – he could never have imagined a different answer, both realizing once again how that humor is, honestly speaking, just an other thing he sincerely loves about him.

«Ouch, ouch, that hurts. Are you saying I’m too old at any case, Koushi?»

«Daichi, I'd tell you not to ask me questions you don’t really want to know the answer–»

And while he listens the other one speaking he feels the slender fingers of his partner gently insinuating between his, drawing his attention just enough his irises finally move in the direction of the beloved one, those cocoa lakes that are his eyes already fixed on him, waiting to be caught by the dark hazelnut eye of the first one.

«But you have been for years with a person with gray hair, so who am I to judge?»

And at this sentence Daichi really can not help but shake his head placidly, amused and incredibly, totally serene as only Koushi manages to make him feel. He takes advantage of that moment to get himself in front of the other, his free hand that goes to touch the guy’s cheek gently while he tilts his head forward, finally putting his forehead on the younger one’s, moving just enough to tickle with the tip of his nose his partner’s one.

«Thanks for waiting for me, Koushi.»

« I wouldn’t even mind an eternal waiting if it meant waiting for you, Daichi.»

And Daichi doesn’t answer, but only 'cause the other one already knows, 'cause their lips are too close now and 'cause any sentence becomes superfluous in front of that gentle brushing.

But deep down they know it, they both can feel it: they both know they would exchange the whole universe eternity for a moment of tenderness and sweetness born of their kiss.

 

––––  


“ _Love is eternal -- the aspect may change, but not the essence. There is the same difference in a person before and after he is in love as there is in an unlighted lamp and one that is burning. The lamp was there and was a good lamp, but now it is shedding light too, and that is its real function. And love makes one calmer about many things, and that way, one is more fit for one's work.”_  
\- Vincent Van Gogh ;  



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